


Time

by Lamaria_12



Series: WIP's [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Family Feels, Friendship, Future, Future! Lance can't tell Past! Keith about his BF, Insecure Keith (Voltron), Insecure Lance (Voltron), Insecurity, Kinda?, M/M, Mutual Pining, Nicknames, Pet Names, Pining, Secret Relationship, Team as Family, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-17
Updated: 2018-05-22
Packaged: 2019-04-24 02:36:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14346192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lamaria_12/pseuds/Lamaria_12
Summary: Pidge makes a teleporter, a great invention for when the team is in a pinch!Luckily, Pidge and Lance *have* the teleporter in said pinch!Unluckily, It's not a teleporter at all, and it sends them 9 years into the past.Also Titled:TIME MAGAZINE: Person of The Year(s) - Lance McClain and Pidge Holt





	1. You Can Use It

**Author's Note:**

> I SWEAR I WILL TRY TO ACTUALLY FINISH THIS ONE.
> 
> Will I finish the other ones I started? hehe... well... see... about that...
> 
> ANYWAY! I actually made something like an outline for this fic, so hopefully I can find the *time* (h3h3h3h3) to work on it, summer break is fast approaching so that's great! (I've also got a million other projects to do)

“Alright! I think it’s done!” Pidge exclaimed, standing up from where she sat in her makeshift studio. Her small, ponytail she had bounced with the movement before it came loose and the hair tie fell onto the floor.

“What- Really?!” Lance startled awake from his dozing on the floor, “Should I go tell everyone?” He was already starting towards the door.

“Yeah! I’m just gonna start working on the covering, so the wires can be protected. Maybe I can get hunk to help me straighten out the metal with that huge ass hammer of his.” Pidge said, not looking at Lance as he left, keeping her focus on the task at hand.

Lance briskly walked down the stairs. The teleporter pidge had made would be a great asset in battle. People could escape before they could get majorly hurt, or… die. He shook his head, he suddenly felt hyper-aware of his metallic leg and the weight of it. He stopped for a second, collecting his thoughts, before continuing his way down the hall again. Lance burst into the control room where everyone was planning missions and stuff, at least, Keith, Allura, and Shiro were. Hunk was probably in the kitchen, organizing the fresh produce from various planets. 

“Guys! I got news from the dark side,” Lance dramatically exclaimed, throwing his arms up. Pidge was known as ‘The Dark Side’ because she worked tirelessly into the dark depths of the night.

“Good to know, is she finished? We’re about to wormhole, we’ve stayed here too long. The empire is bound to catch on to where we are and send ships.” Shiro said, turning to face Lance. He had tired eyes, with large bags under them. There was a long thin slash across one eye, sealing it shut. The scar across his nose had grown pale with time.

“Yeah, haven't tested it yet though so-” Lance’s sentence was cut off as the ship suddenly lurched to the side. He quickly steadied himself by grabbing a chair, the Empire ships had appeared.

“Everyone! Get to your lions!!” Allura called out over the comms, her curly bob falling around her face messily. The call was mostly for show, as Pidge and Hunk had just come through the doors, and everyone else was heading toward their lions. Lance jumped into place and traveled down the tunnel that led to his lion.

They had greatly underestimated how many Empire ships there are.

Holy shit they had underestimated.

“Alright Team! We’re going to take shelter on the planet for a plan!” Shiro had ordered, and they all swerved toward the nearest planet, which was covered in thick harmful gases. No wildlife. Lance had checked. The chemicals weren’t flammable or able to explode. Pidge had checked.

Lance felt for the other’s auras as they plunged into the rust-colored clouds. He latched onto them and they did the same, they kept in formation despite no visibility. 

“There’s got to be as many fighters up there as there was at Exerlibub!” Hunk exclaimed, exasperated. He looked calm enough, but everyone knew his anxiety was getting to him.  
Exerlibub. That place was hell, and one of the fights Voltron had lost. Lost horribly. They were lucky that the surrounding planets were uninhabited because, well, bye bye solar system.

“Hunk, everything’s going to be alright, Pidge is there anything we can do to take out these ships all at once?” Shiro asked, unable to come up with an answer. They could hear fighters all around them, trying to land a shot in the dark.

“Based on my scans, the fighters are being controlled by the big battlecruisers manually. So if we can sneak in and take the cruiser down, the fighters go down too.” Pidge’s words flew fast, much like her train of thoughts, “I could take Lance with me as cover, long range for incoming soldiers and short-range if there’s too many.”

“Sounds good, we’ll be a distraction, for now, get in and get out, we can’t lose you guys for very long. They’re bound to notice two lions missing.” Shiro said, flying upwards. The other’s joined him. Pidge and Lance split off from the team and activated their invisibility cloaks, they flew up to the largest battleship. The green and blue lions couldn’t be seen on any scanners, nor the naked eye, for 4 hours. Pidge had made sure of that. On the ship, Pidge and Lance snuck around with expertise, they both knew the basic layout of a battlecruiser and easily made their way to the main control room with few close encounters. There was a General inside, commanding sentries to search for the remaining blue and green lions that were still on the planet. It almost made Lance want to snicker, the irony of the situation was all too funny. Pidge darted ahead to quickly stab the general in the back, electricity buzzing around the inflicted wound. There was a dying gasp of surprise before he fell to the floor, unmoving. The sentries now turned to them, acknowledging their presence. The group of about 8 sentries hesitated for a split second, likely scanning and generating demands in their code, before firing erratically. Pidge and Lance had both used the moment of hesitance well to duck behind the main castle. Lance could hear them coming closer, and pidge was beeping away at her bayard’s bomb setting. The bayard generated a bomb and she threw it behind her, the small electrical explosion enough to kill most of the sentries without hurting either of them. Lance got on a knee and propped his sniper up quickly taking down the remaining sentries. Pidge stood up soon after the last hunk of metal hit the ground, and started to work on shutting off the fighters.

“Lance cover me from the doorway, this’ll be done in 25 minutes tops. The empire has been getting better at encrypting their accessibilities to different commands.” Pidge said as different hologram screens started popping up in front of her. Lance hummed in agreement and stationed himself at the entrance to the control room.  
Sentries and Soldiers alike were already flooding the hallways from either side, surprising Lance. It was a sea of robotics and people alike, it didn’t look like there was an end. Pidge must’ve tripped some alarm, or maybe it alerted them when the commander or the sentries died. Either way, they were swarmed.

“Pidge this is bad!” Lance shouted, slamming the door shut with his Empire-tech compatible glove, “We’re already overwhelmed, there’s no way we can take them. It’ll be like Disney world in summer with a discount in here before soon!” Pidge growled mumbling about not having enough time while Lance relayed their position and news to the team. The door was being hammered and dented. It wouldn’t be long before they broke it down. Lance figured they could eject themselves out into space, and risk being shot by the fighters before Blue and Green got to them. The lions were on the other side of the ship, there’s no way they’d make it.

“Lance! Stay safe, you can make it through this. Please.” Keith yelled at him through the comms, the sturdy voice that rang with the solid confidence that Lance loved, wavered with worry. That was when the severity of the situation set in. They were about to be flooded with enemies. Their only choice to either stay and die or throw themselves into space by somehow cracking the glass and getting shot by fighters. Great. 

“Relax Keith, you think I’d let your ~boyfriend~ die here and now? Hell no. Lucky for him, I actually like him. So, again, lucky for him, he gets to live.” Pidge snickered as she held up a familiar remote control, her eyes not leaving the hologram pages. Lance scoffed. Keith stuttered a bit, secretly loving the word ‘Boyfriend’ being used, mocking tone or no.

“Um, rude much? Also, we need to get out-NOW” Lance shouted as the doors screeched open about an inch, a couple lucky shots getting through. Lance put up his shield and pressed is back to Pidge’s, protecting her from any potential shots.

“Damnit! I don’t have time to get it, we need a wormhole Allura. Immediately. I don’t care if there’s not enough room or time. Lance and I are using the teleporter to get back.

“Wait! But Lance said it’s not tested yet!” “Isn’t an untested prototype dangerous…?” Keith and Hunk said at the same time, Keith’s shout drowning out most of Hunk’s worried comment. 

“We don’t have enough time. Unless one of you can get over here and away from the planet’s atmosphere and pick us up in time, I don’t think there’s any other option. Besides, I’m sure we’ll be fine. None of us are strangers to risk.” Pidge said gravely as she set up the teleporter.

No one said anything to that. Her last words rang grimmly.

“See you at the castle Firebird,” Lance winked at Keith after a moment, even though he couldn’t see him.

“Yeah… later Snowflake, I love you” Keith’s voice was soft, and it made Lance’s heart melt. The nicknames were special to them. A promise, reassurance of their insecurities, and something that just they had.

“I love you too, but don’t act like it’s a goodbye, goodbyes aren’t allowed. Only see you laters, kay Firebird?” Lance was unsure why Keith was so tense, maybe it was the battle, the uneasiness with the teleporter, or just his instincts. His instincts were never wrong, so Lance silently hoped it was just uneasiness. Besides, tested or not, Pidge wouldn’t get them killed. They’d be fine.

They both activated the teleporter right as the doors busted down.

Pidge and Lance blipped out of sight.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Pidge was taking apart a Galra sentry hand, already disabling the tracker (duh) in the ‘Living Room’. Which was basically the room with the super big couch. Lance and Keith were bickering, Hunk was dozing, Shiro was trying to ignore Lance and Keith, Coran was telling a story that nobody was listening to, and Allura was brushing her hair. It was the normal, everyday stuff. What wasn’t everyday stuff was the electricity that was buzzing over Pidge’s skin.

“Uhhh… Guys?” Pidge held out her arms as everyone turned to her. Pidge’s arms were sparking with electricity.

“Pidge! Did you shock yourself?” Shiro jumped up to inspect her arms closer.

“No… the circuits are all dead, there’s no electricity in them…” Pidge drew her hands closer to her face. The electricity was green, and becoming more frequent, and staying for longer periods of time.

“Holy Quiznack it’s happening to me too!!” Lance screamed as he shot his arms out, and sure enough, the green electricity was trailing and flickering over his body as well.

“Okay, everyone calm down, we can get you to the cryo-” Shiro was cut off by a bright, blinding flash. It disappeared without a trace as quickly as it came.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Constructive Criticism is encouraged! I'm always open to improving my writing ^~^
> 
> Tumblr: @Scarlett-Nighten


	2. -

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not entirely proud of this chapter, there's a *lot* of dialogue.

Everyone in the room stood up, Keith was hesitating to reach out and shake Lance’s shoulder. He looked… bigger, his head was tilted back over the couch edge limply, his arms draped across the back of the couch. In pidge’s spot, she was slumped forward. For some reason, both were wearing their paladin armor.

“What… just... happened?” Hunk asked, eyes darting from Lance to Pidge and back to Lance.

“Uugh, shiiiit” Lance groaned, he was the first to come to life. His head tipped forward, and he cracked his neck.

“Language!” Shiro said out of reflex. Hunk and Keith glanced at him as if to say, ‘Is this really the time?’

“Fuuuck you, I’m 26. I’ll curse as much as I damn well please,” Came the immediate answer from Lance. Which seemed to make Pidge stirr. Shiro let out out a confused, ‘26?’

“W-what? Shouldn’t we be.. In the hangar? Prototype must need tweaking.” Pidge said, snapping her head up to look at everyone, she squinted at them questioningly, “You guys look really weird.”

“We look weird? You’re the one that came out of nowhere in a flash wearing your armor!” Keith yelled, exasperated. 

“Shchchchch,” Lance hushed the red paladin, putting a finger gently to Keith’s lips, “Please don’t yell Firebird, I’ve got a killer headache. Did we win? We were in a tight spot, and y’all look mighty comfortable considering the battle we just had” Lance chuckled.

“Um, excuse me paladins, but we haven’t had a battle the past two days, and wasn’t a bad one at that. So, if I may ask, what do you last remember?” Allura, as always, was the one to get straight to the point.

“We were in the control room on a battlecruiser, class R, Model 756-9o10. I don’t understand, you should know this, and- did you use your shapeshifting to make your hair long?” Pidge’s train of thought went off it’s rails when she realized how everyone looked. She immediately snapped out of her hazy stupor. Lance seem to snap out as well when Keith backed away to stand by Shiro.

“What did my teleporter DO?!” Pidge yelled, looking at her friends who looked, oh so foreign. They almost looked… Younger, untouched by the war. She stood up, wavering a bit on her feet before whipping her head to observe her surroundings. She looked especially confused at the abandoned, useless, sentry arm on the table.

“Pidge,” Lance said warily, “I think you’re ‘teleporter’, teleported us into the past.” Lance stood up too, before jabbing a finger at Keith, “What were we just doing?”

“Umm, fighting? Like usual?” Keith seemed confused, his eyes flickering over Lance before forcing them to concentrate on the floor. Cheeks pink.

“See? Proof.” Lance crossed his arms in accomplishment.

“But I don’t- understand, I- Where the hell did I go so wrong? What was in that p-prototype?” Pidge’s eyes were wide with disbelief until she shook her head, collecting herself. “Okay, Lance and I are in the past because my prototype went wrong. My prototype is not currently with us so that means it’s either on the galra ship, destroyed with use, or in green’s hangar where we are assuming that past Lance and Pidge currently are, right?” She rambles, paraphrasing what has just occured.

“Woah, wait, you guys are from the future?!” Hunk’s excited voice cut through the tension in the room like a bullet. “So like, how far in the future? Also how did you guys get those scars? That’s making me really worried, and since your from the future can’t we like, y’know, prevent that from happening? Actually couldn’t we fix all of our troubles from the future? I mean, like, everything could be breeze for awhile, that’d be great!” 

Lance and Pidge exchanged faces.

“As much as I want to avoid everything that we’ve been through, the experiences have changed me, and made me more aware of the war. They’ve taught me things that I never would’ve learned on my own. We’ve avoided missions that could have ended in blood because of what we’ve learned. Plus, I became a little less naive. Which, is a good thing considering our situation.” Lance said wistfully. A small, knowing smile on his face.

“Lance is right, even if we do avoid a lot of potentially fatal events, we don’t know the repercussions of avoiding them.” Pidge added on. Hunk slumped in defeat, disappointed.

“I’m sure we can tell you the non essential stuff though! We’re not eating food goo everyday, especially not after Coran and Allura learned that it affected our health to not have solid food.

“Aww man! Can’t wait for that to happen, as it is now I can only make good stuff when we restock at planets and for diplomatic missions.” Hunk sighed.

“Actually, there’s a question I’ve been meaning to ask.” Pidge says as she uses a finger to push at the bridge of her nose. Probably out of habit because she wasn’t currently wearing her glasses. “How long have you been in space?”

“Our Pidge had been keeping track about 3 months.” Keith supplied, who had been quiet the whole conversation. Shiro and Allura seemed to have disappeared. Presumably to the control room in order to conduct research on cases of time travel.

Pidge and Lance went silent at that. Looking from one another. 

“...So wait… How old am I exactly...currently?” Lance asked slowly, cautiously.

“You turned 17 awhile ago, I think we’d be in like, mid-late fall on Earth” Hunk answered.

“17… I was a wee baby! ‘Dis tall and waddlin’!” Lance went straight to the dramatics, hand measuring at his hip.

“Oh stop it Lance, you grew a couple inches, get over it.” Pidge grumbled, a smile gracing her lips.

“Says the person who didn’t grow at all.”

“Bitch” Pidge said, in a warning tone. Hunk laughed weakly at their banter, making an off-hand comment about preparing dinner out of the alien produce from the planet.

“LE GASP, Pidge? Cursing? THINK OF THE CHILDREN!” Lance gestured wildly to Keith, who looked exasperated. Lance slid over to Keith and put his hands over his ears, Keith seemed to tense immediately, an irritated scowl on his face. “The lil’ babs innocence is at stake! Look! He’s… He’s so smol! I think I’mma gonna cri!” Lance yelled wiping away tears with one hand while the other measured Keith’s head at mid chest. Keith’s scowl deepened.

“I’m going to go train.” Keith grumbled, taking a glance at Lance before leaving. After the door closed behind them, Lance sighed.

“Well, they’re all gone now. What’s our next move Pidge?” Lance sat down beside her, voice serious. His fingers locked together as they rested on his knees.

“I’m not sure. I’m not even sure how this all went wrong! I mean, how was time-travel even a considerable outcome?! I knew it might’ve been something that could be achievable hypothetically, but it shouldn’t have been that easy! I got the blueprint from that Alzkahara merchant who didn’t even know what it was, I know I translated it right. Unless that Merkachint was a backstabbing mya-” Pidge rambled until Lance cut her off by putting his hands on her shoulders and forcing her to face him.

“Pidge. Listen to me, don’t stress over this alright?” Lance tried to reason with her quickening breaths, trying to calm her.

“Don’t Stress?! DON’T STRESS?! LANCE WE ARE IN THE FUCKING PAST! H-how can you be so calm? What about Keith?! What if we’re stuck here forever and you can never see him again, or what if the time travel has side effects that kills the both of us, hell, past Pidge and Lance might already be dead in the future. Maybe they just blipped out of existence! Maybe this is our role in the universe now! Maybe-”

*Smack*

Pidge’s head leaned a bit to the left, a small, barely-there mark on her cheek.

“Sorry Pidge, but I did promise to knock some sense into you if your mind started to get out of hand.” Lance had a lopsided smile on his face, and Pidge honestly didn’t know how he could do it. Didn’t wearing that confident mask get old?

“Yeah… you’re right, I just- I hate it when things don’t go as planned” Pidge sighed, her face relaxing. Lance could tell she was finally calming down to re-analyze their situation with new eyes. Which was more than he could say for himself. They both hated when things didn’t go as planned.

Things didn’t go as planned when Lance lost his leg.

Or when he got the claw marks on his face and chest.

Or when Pidge got the lightning-like scars across her back, shoulder, and left cheek

Things didn’t go as planned whenever they almost die.

After all, that’s normally what ‘Things didn’t go as planned’ means to them- Somebody might die tonight.

They were determined that to not be the case this time.

~^~^~

“End training program!” Keith called out, the bot falling through the floor like usual. He took a towel from the corner to wipe away his sweat before picking up his water bottle. He didn’t like having ‘future’ versions of Pidge and Lance here. It wouldn’t be good for voltron, what would they do if they had to fight? Keith thought back to future Lance’s toned stomach and lean muscles, visible underneath the alien spandex of the suit. He could probably hold himself in a fight, hell he could probably put Keith down just fine-

Okay, so he’d be good in a fight! Yup! Yay! he’d be great, no reason to think about that anymore!

Keith sighed, hating how his cheeks burned. Damnit future Lance. Damn how hot he looks too, scars aren’t fair! (Even if it does make him worry but he won’t tell him that) At least being from the future doesn’t change how annoying he is. 

Keith left the training room, heading to the kitchen for a snack. Maybe food can help his mind process that Lance and Pidge from the freaking future are here. Hunk was inside the kitchen, preparing some food.

“Hey Hunk.” Keith groaned, rolling his sore shoulders as he sat down at the counter.

“Oh Keith! Thank goodness you’re here I can’t bear not being able to actually talk to people anymore.” Hunk said, smiling as he passed Keith a plate of some kind of alien dish.

“Can’t talk to?” Keith queried, cocking his head.

“Well, Pidge and Lance are gone, and I mean… I don’t really… *know* the future one’s y’know?” Hunk sat down across from Keith with his own plate and a pouch of water.

“I guess.”

“Yeah, I’m kind of worried like- I don’t know if I’m mentally prepared to have a life or death situation yet, I was kind of avoiding thinking about it. Obviously they’ve seen some though.”

Shit this was going to be a serious conversation, like- one where he might need to give comfort

“It’s bound to happen eventually. It won’t wait for us to prepare” ...Fuck

Hunk’s eyes went downcast, “Yeah… you’re right. We can’t expect to win every battle I guess. On the bright side, at least they live through those situations! It’s comforting,,, to know they won’t die.”

“Yeah, all we can really do is move forward. I mean, Pidge from the future is smart, she’ll get us back our Pidge and Lance. The only thing we need to worry about is Voltron and fighting together.” Keith got up from his seat, plate empty. Part of him didn’t realize he’d been eating. He washed the dishes, while Hunk seemed to be contemplating something.

“We should all train together. Maybe they could teach us a thing or two! I mean, maybe we can’t know the big events but training and getting better isn’t bad right?” Hunk said, his voice seemed to be more optimistic now than earlier. Keith had a sigh of relief internally. Looks like he was able to make Hunk feel better.

“We’ll talk about it with the others tomorrow. I’m going to go to bed. It’s been a long day,” Keith said with finality as he walked out into the hall.

“Ditto man, I’m beat” Hunk called after him.

-

Keith walked into his room and laid down on his bed. He was a conspiracy theorist, but he never believed in time travel before. He knew that you could hypothetically travel into the future by going at a fast enough speed, but that was a couple minutes to an hour to a possible day. Not... not years. Keith feels like he should be more surprised, that they all should've been more surprised. Maybe everyone was still digesting it, hell, most of them were still digesting the fact that Voltron is a thing and that they're fighting a war.

Keith idly wonders how Lance and Pidge are doing in the future, it's his last thought before he falls into a fitful sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Constructive Criticism is wanted! I want to make sure the chapter is as good as it can be ^~^\
> 
> Tumblr: Scarlett-nighten


	3. But You Can't Own It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Keith threatens Lance surprisingly graphically, Pidge doesn't know how to solve problems and everything is different in the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! I took away the 8 chapter count because it's going a little slower than planned, enjoy the chapter ^~^

The ship had wormholed away.

On the outside, it was the picture of serenity, a white, blue, and grey castle against a watercolor painting of purples and reds. A spectrum of dark blues to bright greens, all upon a black canvas. Multicolored stars glittering like diamonds overlaying it all. It looked like one of the many wonders of the universe.

On the inside, the tension was thick like syrup. High, hot, and boiling over.

The paladins were running down the corridor to the green lion’s hangar. Hoping, begging that their friends were there; That the teleporter worked and they were laughing in spite of their previous danger.

Keith was the first to break through the door and launched himself at the first sight of blue.

“Oh my god Lance, Thank fucking Qxirell your okay! You’ve got to stop getting yourself into these- these situations where you almost die oh my god, one of these times is going to be your last and I don’t think I could ever handle that so please-”

“Oh my god” was a surprised sound from Pidge, but Keith ignored her for the sake of burying his face into Lance’s shoulder and clutching at the back of his jacket. He was practically curled over the smaller being-

Jacket? Smaller? 

Keith pulled away, hands still clutching Lance’s shoulders. Lance, or who he presumed to be Lance, was the epitome of confusion and uncomfortableness.

“Wow, mullet I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so happy to see me…?” Lance squeaked out, a painful smile on his face. The rest of the team looked between the two children, who look just as confused as they were.

“Who are you? Why do you look like our paladins?” Allura asked, looking between the two persons.

Lance was about to make a snide remark about how they didn’t know who they were, but he instead screamed as he fell to the floor. Next thing he knew, Keith had two blades pushed up against his throat. One was his Bayard, the other was some kind of longer version of his usual knife.

“Who the hell are you and where is my Lance,” Keith growled, his eyes lighting up with unbridled rage, hurt, and fear. Anger at this obvious imposter, hurt at the fact his Lance was gone, fear for where he was- if he was of this realm anymore at all.

“Woah, hey I don’t ‘belong’ to- EP!” Lance screeched as the blades pressed closer. 

“I asked you a goddamn question, and if you don’t answer I’ll slit your neck and let you bleed. Making you regret ever landing a fucking hand on him for the ten seconds you have left to live.” Keith barked, keeping Lance securely pinned to the floor.

“H-hey man, please, I thought we were buddies? Can we please talk this out instead of you killing me!” Lance squeaked, eyes glossy and heart racing.

“Lance and I were just in the lounge room! What the hell Keith?!” Pidge shrieked taking a few cautious, yet determined steps forward.

“Woah, Keith calm down it’s okay, we can talk about this-” Shiro put his hands in the air.

“TALK?! You want me to TALK to these obvious imposters?! This is just like with Kuron! I won’t talk until I have Lance back!” Keith yelled pulling back a bit from Lance, which now that Lance got a better look at him… he looked very… different.

“Keith- You-You’re hair isn’t a mullet anymore!” Lance screeched, which made Keith’s attention snap back to him and Pidge groan.

“That’s what you’re worried about right now?! I haven’t had a ‘mullet’ in 4 years!” 

 

“I’m not worried mull- Keith, I’m jumping for joy that you finally got a fashion sense!” Lance sat up to meet Keith eye-level. 

“Lance shut up.” Pidge snapped, to which Lance slumped.

“Don’t tell Lance to shut up!” Keith shouted in his defense.

“Who’s side are you on?!” Pidge yelled, exasperated. She sighed heavily and turned to the rest of the paladins, some of which found the conversation amusing (Hunk, Coran) and other’s were still wary (Allura, Shiro). “Lance and I were just in the makeshift living room thingy, and then suddenly we just appeared here! So I demand an explanation.”

Everyone else looked among each other, a conversation in silence. Pidge and Lance couldn’t understand what they were thinking, but they hoped it was in their favor.

The first thing to break the tense silence was Shiro’s sigh, and in response, the rest of the paladins stopped exchanging glances and put their full attention on Shiro.

“Alright everyone, I think the best thing we can do is put them in the dungeon downstairs for now. At least until we found out what happened. They look… a lot younger, the Empire knows what we look like. They wouldn’t mess up so bad to make us look like us from like… 8 years ago? 9?” Shiro reasoned, and everyone seemed to agree with him. Pidge and Lance were still lost, “Alright, Keith, you can take Pidge and Lance to the dungeon. Hunk, Allura, Coran and I will take a look a Pidge’s teleporter.” Everyone hummed an affirmative and got to work.

Keith got up from his previous position - practically straddling lance - and picked him up by his hoodie. Lance let out a squeak at the show of strength, and was dragged across the floor where he took Pidge’s hand. She tried to resist by pulling her hand against his to get out of his grip; Keith looked at her boredly, most likely because of the lack of strength, and tugged at her hand harshly which caused her to stumble forward and bump into Keith. 

~~~

“If this is an alternate reality where am I? Do I have a girlfriend? Am I married? Did we go back to Earth? Please tell me my wedding was on Earth.” Lance chattered to Keith who was guarding while Pidge fidgeted, thinking.

“...Am I dead…?” Keith flinched at that.

“Woah Lance,” Pidge blurted out, surprised his thoughts would be that dark.

“I mean, it’s not improbable!” Lance reasoned, “We’re in a war.”

“You’re not dead. You can’t be. You’re strong. When things don’t go according to plan, you make it into a plan.” Keith’s voice wavered, and he turned away. He heard Lance squeak though.

“Wow, Keith complimenting Lance? Never thought that would happen.” Pidge said, surprised.

“Yeah tell me about it- I-I MEAN. OF COURSE, KEITH THINKS I’M AWESOME. IT JUST TAKES KEITH AWHILE - LIKE FUTURE VERSION OF HIMSELF OR WHATEVS - WHILE. PERFECTLY NORMAL AMOUNT OF TIME FOR SOMEONE TO OWN UP AND TALK TO THEIR IDOL. RIGHT KEITH?” Lance painfully tried to keep up his narcissistic mask, failing horribly. 

Keith let out a breathy chuckle, which weirdly made Lance’s heart shiver. Pidge let out a gasp.

“Wait, future version?” Pidge asked, leaning forward. Catching Lance’s attention back to her.

“Yeah…? It’s like an alternate universe but we’re older and farther into the war. Y’know, ‘cuz Keith said that his hair grew out of a mullet like 4 years ago or somethin’?” Lance explained, the conversation causing Keith to glance at them considering their words.

“Are you saying that you think you came from the past?” Keith proposed slowly, “It certainly wouldn’t be the strangest thing that has happened, and it seems more plausible than just so happening to find an alternate universe just like ours but younger. I mean, there’s an infinite amount of other realities.” A spark in Keith’s eyes lit as he started to theorize. 

Lance couldn’t seem to take his eyes off of him, he’d never seen Keith… genuinely excited about anything other than flying. Which, don’t get Lance wrong, Keith looked absolutely stunning while he flew. Lance frowned internally at his thoughts, he just hoped his dumb celebrity, puppy love crush thing was gone in the maybe-future. His mama talked a lot about celebrity crushes, and how they were fine, but to realize that they were probably nothing deep. Of course, she probably meant his crush on Beyonce and not some super cool prodigy at school, but po-tay-toes poh-tat-toes, right?

“Honestly, how do I screw up so bad that I make a time-traveling machine instead of a teleporter? What the heck?” Pidge sputtered incredulously, causing Lance to snap out of his dissociation. He made a questioning sound at the open cell door, and Keith and Pidge talking outside.

“What? What happened? You guys figure everything out already?” Lance asked, plucking himself off the ground and walking out the door with his hands in his pockets. 

“Um yeah, were you not paying attention?” Pidge raised an eyebrow at Lance, who seemed to laugh nervously.

“It’s alright Lance, you’ve been through a lot. It’s okay to take some time to think about it all.” Keith comforted him with a smile that - holy crap - blew his breath away. 

“Don’t bother Keith, he was probably just daydreaming about ‘oh how Allura is so amazing and hot and I just looooooveeeee her!!’” Pidge cackled at her own impression. Lance let out a ‘hey!’, and an unreadable expression flickered onto Keith’s face before it was gone. It seemed to be a mix of a lot of emotions, though it didn’t seem to be entirely bad.

~~~

They walked through the door into the main control room. Where Hunk, Shiro, and Allura had moved pidge’s teleporter. Keith and Pidge explained their thoughts about them being from the past while Lance examined the teleporter itself. It was small and about the size of a regular stovetop. The top of it was black and glossy like it was made of glass, and the rest of it was a green metal covering. It looked like some kind of scrap metal from the Green Lion. It gave the whole thing the trademarked color codedness that Voltron seemed to uphold. 

“Couldn’t we just use it again? I mean it switched places with us before. We could just make the switch again.” Pidge piped up, where Allura was there to immediately put it down.

“That’s the problem. It completely inoperable. We don’t have the other half, the half that was left on the galra ship.” Allura explained, before being cut off by Pidge.

“Which is a serious flaw that I have a problem with by the way! Why would you make one-time use teleporter? It’s just stupid and inefficient.” Pidge groaned.

“It was just a prototype, it wasn’t completely finished. Of course, there were major problems. It was mostly made for a fatal emergency, not common use anyway.” Keith nudged her in the side with his elbow.

“As I was saying,” She glared at Pidge, who threw up her arms, “And we can’t exactly remake it either. For one, we don’t have the blueprints, Pidge never keeps them around. For two, even if we did, we don’t know what mistakes our Pidge made in order to change it from a teleporter to a time traveling machine.”

“Damnit,” Pidge cursed, and her heart cracked at the fact that Shiro didn’t answer with a stern ‘Language’. Instead, he just looked tired - he seriously seems to need to retire - and expectant at Pidge. The situation was bearing down on her. Will they ever get back home? How old is Matt - if he’s still alive - now? After the estimated 9 years, their age gap would be even larger. She mentally shook this off, everything always turned out alright. She glanced at the scars that her friends accumulated over time. Well, hopefully, most of the time. 

She looked at Lance who was looking closely at the teleporter. 

For the first time in a long time, she didn’t know how to solve a problem presented to her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Little glimpse into the future before we head back to the past~
> 
> Tumble: @Scarlett-nighten


End file.
